Beckhams told to cut spending

Age has a nasty way of creeping up on everybody – even soccer’s sexiest ball-bender and his pretty, pouting missus. David Beckham has taken a few hard knocks lately.

First there was the Achilles tendon injury that put paid to his dream of a final World Cup, then he was axed from the England team and to top it all he’s seen his vision of youth football academies go down the tube.

Instead of making money for Becks and his partners the soccer schools – one in England, the other in America – have been bleeding money and have closed their doors after only three years.

Once the go-to guy when it came to endorsements David (35) has lost many of the contracts that brought in £26 million (about R300 million) and is expected to have shed them all by the end of the year. The business of advertising is all about the young, the beautiful and the talented.

Becks had his years in the spotlight – now it’s all about Cristiano Ronaldo and other members of the buff boyish brigade.

All of which means David and Victoria (36) have to tighten their designer belts. They brought in a financial expert who looked at their books and ordered them to trim the fat – and the fat turned out to be 14 staff members caring for their four homes around the world.

Six gardeners in the south of France, a cleaner at Beckingham Palace in England and a chauffeur have been given the chop, saving the Beckhams £600 000(about R7 million) a year.

“They realised they needed to let some of their staff go,” an insider says. “They live full-time in the USA so some adjustments were made. It’s fair to say there has been a bit of trimming although there is certainly no crisis.”

You can say that again. Apart from the house in France and the British mansion, they own a spread in Los Angeles and a house on Dubai’s exclusive Palm Island.The value of the fleet of cars in their garages could cancel the debt of a small Third World country – and Posh’s wardrobe could probably clothe most of that country’s female population.

There are still enough staff at their LA home “to trip over”, an observer comments, and they aren’t exactly skimping on entertainment or travel.

Sons Brooklyn (11), Romeo (8) and Cruz (5) go to one of LA’s most exclusive schools and two nannies help care for them.

Both Posh and Becks have personal assistants as well as a housekeeper, several gardeners and a crew of security guards.

“But the shine has come off Goldenballs,” English celebrity journalist Alison Boshoff says. “And Victoria’s fashion business, while high profile, is said to be in profit only because of the cheesy mass-market appeal of the couple’s Coty perfumes that bear their names.”